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can you but one or two jack dempseys in a 20 gallon??

Only if you're going to get a bigger tank as they will get too big for a 20 and the chances of aggression would be far too high.

A jack dempsey gets much too large for a twenty gallon tank. If you had fifty-five gallons, then a male/female pair would be okay. As it is, you're better off looking for other fish.

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

i agree, if jacks are in anything to small they dont get to there full color and size potential. my buddy had a jack in a long 20usg but i told him the jack would do better in my tank. so i had him for 3 months and hes already grown and inch and now he is a real dark blue with light blue metalic spots. so i would hold off on putting a jack in a 20g.

meh, I knew someone who had a full grown JD in a 20 for years and years and he was always healthy. I wouldn't have ANY tankmates for a fish in that situation though, especially considering the JDs are so agressive.

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Putting a 10" fish in a 30" tank is cruel. Just because he seemed healthy means nothing when he can't move.

-Molly
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Personaly I'm edgy about keeping my gold pearlscale angel in my 30 gallon, and it doesn't have the expecations for size or aggression of a JD. I would say for a maated pair of them, a 55 gal. is perfect, but you'll end up needing a place for the fry (raise n' sell in a new tank or give away as fry maybe?). If you happen to like cichlids and can only manage a 20 gal, I would look towards the dwarf end of things.

Now I'm not sure how much you know about fish, but if you go the dwarf cichlid rout, you'll likely find rams and kribensis for sale most often. I would reccomend avoiding rams or any apistogramma (closely related, rams were clasified as being apisto's for a while) as a starter fish unless you're in the mood for some heavy reading. A single kribensis is something else you could do, though they get tricky to keeep in a community tank sometimes. Another option would be doing a mated pair of kribensis, but do not keep any other fish in the tank, unless of course you happen to have a fully grown arowana sitting around- one of those might survive hehe.

jack dempseys, imo, shouldn't be kept in anything less than either a 36" x 18" tank or 48" x 13". A jack dempsey doesn't belong in a 20 gallon tank for more than maybe 4 months to grow up a little for a larger tank.